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Actors in "Absurd Person Singular" - Photo by Ross Topol

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• The Station Theatre »
  223 N. Broadway Ave. Urbana, IL 61801
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The Celebration Company’s next production of its 2009 summer season is the British playwright’s Alan Ayckbourn’s sensational 1972 dark comedy Absurd Person Singular at Urbana’s Station Theatre. After its successful initial run in Great Britain, it completed a smash Broadway run in 1974 to early 1976. Joi Hoffsommer, veteran Station Theatre actress, steps up to direct her first production at Station.

Ayckbourn’s tale is set over three successive Christmas celebrations concerning three British couples: a socially inept contractor Sidney Hopcroft and his submissive wife, Jane; an architect Geoffrey Turner and his suicidal/depressed wife, Eva; and an upper-class banker Ronald Brewster-Wright and his alcoholic wife, Marion. Like many of Ayckbourn’s later plays, Absurd Person Singular tackles numerous social class issues and the contrast of social demeanors.

As with many of his plays, Ayckbourn’s characters don’t exactly address their problems directly but shelter their awkwardness with quaint witticisms. As the playwright once stated in his A Crash Course in Playwriting, “Few people say what they mean. And when they do say what they mean, they will often hide their true intention for saying it. Conversely, people will often express their feelings about life, each other when they are talking about something completely different. In other words, their subconscious often says more about them than their best rehearsed efforts.”

Don’t miss this local production of this rarely produced, wonderful play by the man once dubbed as England’s Neil Simon. The Celebration Company’s For ticket information, call the Station Theatre at 384-4000.